Our Team
Devol Legal brings together specialists with experience across law, regulation, public-sector transformation and commercial governance. What unites the team is not only technical expertise, but a practical understanding of how public bodies make decisions, manage risk and deliver services under scrutiny.
Lee Vallender
Qualified barrister. 15+ years advising public sector organisations. Nine years at Deloitte UK LLP.
Lee founded Devol Legal to provide the kind of regulatory advisory support that he saw public bodies consistently struggling to access: technically rigorous, operationally grounded, and capable of surviving scrutiny from members, auditors and the courts.
His practice spans licensing, enforcement, governance, markets regulation and public sector transformation. He is most frequently instructed where matters involve overlapping legal and operational complexity — contested licensing decisions with political dimensions, fragmented regulatory frameworks requiring modernisation, or transformation programmes where governance cannot afford to drift.
Representative experience
- Led a city-wide overhaul of markets and street trading regulation for Devonshire East Council, consolidating over 30 years of legacy instruments into a single defensible framework
- Designed and implemented a workforce governance compliance framework for Brent LBC across 12 policy areas, achieving zero non-compliance findings at subsequent external audit
- Advised the Home Office on aligning local authority licensing functions with immigration enforcement objectives under the Immigration Act 2016, developing a cross-agency protocol adopted across six pilot authorities and endorsed for national rollout
- Supported multiple metropolitan authorities on contested licensing hearings involving premises, taxi, and special treatment licensing where decisions carried significant political and reputational risk
- Led regulatory transformation programmes at Deloitte UK for local authorities facing budget constraints, delivering efficiency improvements of up to 30% whilst maintaining governance standards
Leah Cartwright
14 years in local authority enforcement. Former Principal Trading Standards Officer.
Leah brings the kind of frontline enforcement experience that most consultancies lack entirely. Having spent over a decade managing regulatory caseloads in two busy metropolitan authorities, she understands not just what the law requires, but what enforcement teams actually face when implementing it — resource constraints, political sensitivities, and the practical realities of proportionate intervention.
Her work at Devol Legal focuses on markets and street trading regulation, consumer protection enforcement, and the interface between policy intent and enforcement delivery. She is particularly effective where authorities need advice grounded in the operational reality of how regulatory teams work day to day.
Representative experience
- Developed a revised street trading consent framework for a London borough, resolving longstanding inconsistencies in pitch allocation and reducing processing complaints by over 40%
- Led a trading standards enforcement review for a county council, redesigning case prioritisation and escalation procedures to improve case outcomes and officer confidence
- Advised on the regulatory response to illegal market trading across multiple authority areas, developing a coordinated enforcement approach that balanced deterrence with proportionality
- Supported byelaw modernisation programmes for two metropolitan boroughs, translating historic market charter provisions into workable modern instruments
James Calloway
Former Senior Manager, PwC Government & Public Sector. MBA (Manchester Business School).
James’s background is in the hard end of public sector transformation — not the strategy deck, but the operating model change that follows it. Having spent a decade at PwC advising councils and public bodies on service redesign, he knows that the gap between a compelling business case and a working new service is where most programmes fail.
At Devol Legal, James leads on transformation and strategic advisory engagements. His particular strength is helping regulatory services reshape their operating arrangements without losing governance integrity or frontline capability. He is the person clients call when the ambition is clear but the route to implementation is not.
Representative experience
- Led the restructure of a county council’s environmental health and trading standards division, delivering a 30% efficiency improvement whilst maintaining service quality and statutory compliance
- Designed a target operating model for a combined authority’s regulatory services function, enabling shared service delivery across three council areas
- Supported a metropolitan borough in implementing a digital-first licensing service, reducing average processing times from 28 days to 11
- Advised on the governance and assurance framework for a major public sector transformation programme involving over 200 staff across four service areas
Naomi Kitson
Dual-qualified solicitor and environmental health practitioner. Former Weightmans LLP and LGA.
Naomi occupies a rare position in the regulatory advisory market: she is both a qualified solicitor and an environmental health practitioner, giving her a dual perspective on licensing and regulatory matters that is genuinely unusual. She understands the legal framework from the inside, but she also understands how regulatory decisions play out in practice — in committee rooms, in contested hearings, and in the enforcement actions that follow.
Her practice at Devol Legal centres on licensing policy development, hearing preparation, contested regulatory matters, and the careful drafting required to support decisions that need to withstand challenge. Clients value her for procedural precision and an ability to see vulnerabilities before they become problems.
Representative experience
- Drafted a comprehensive revised licensing policy statement for a metropolitan authority under the Licensing Act 2003, ensuring consistency with cumulative impact assessments and late-night levy provisions
- Prepared and supported contested licensing hearings involving high-profile premises in city centre locations where decisions attracted significant public and media interest
- Advised on the legal and procedural framework for taxi licensing reform across a combined authority area, addressing driver standards, vehicle conditions, and cross-border enforcement
- Reviewed and strengthened the decision-making procedures for a licensing committee that had faced two successful judicial review challenges in the preceding year
Daniel Osei
MCIPS-qualified. 11 years across NHS Supply Chain and county council procurement.
Daniel brings the kind of procurement experience that only comes from having managed complex public sector procurements from the inside. His 11 years across NHS Supply Chain and two county councils mean he has navigated the full lifecycle — from pre-market engagement and specification development through evaluation, award, and contract management — in environments where compliance, transparency and audit trail are non-negotiable.
At Devol Legal, Daniel advises on procurement governance, commissioning structures, contract frameworks and commercial risk. He is particularly valuable where clients need to strengthen their procurement discipline without creating bureaucratic paralysis, or where a procurement exercise needs external assurance to give the decision-makers confidence.
Representative experience
- Reviewed and restructured procurement governance arrangements for a county council following an internal audit that identified significant weaknesses in documentation and decision-trail
- Advised on the commissioning framework for a major health and social care integration programme, ensuring compliance with both NHS and local authority procurement requirements
- Supported a metropolitan authority in conducting a competitive dialogue procurement for a complex multi-year facilities management contract valued at £18 million
- Designed a contract management framework for a public body managing over 200 supplier relationships, introducing risk-based tiering and structured performance review processes